Balaam answered Balak, “Did I not already tell the messengers you sent me
12. And Balaam said unto Balak. Balaam speaks the truth, indeed, yet in a bad spirit, as we have seen: for he excuses himself with servility “II fait le chien couchant.” — Fr. to Balak, that it did not depend on himself that he did not comply with his wishes, but that God had stood in the way.
We have here the conclusion of this vain attempt to curse Israel, and the total abandonment of it. 1. Balak made the worst of it. He broke out into a rage against Balaam (Num 24:10), expressed both in words and gesture the highest degree of vexation at the disappointment; he smote his hands together, for indignation, to see all his measures thus broken, and his project baffled.
Commenting on Numbers 24:10-14
And Balaam said unto Balak,.... In order to mitigate his wrath, and bring him into a better temper: spake I not also to thy messengers which thou sentest unto me: those that came to him a second time; for to the first he said nothing of what is after related, but to the last he did much the same as he had afterwards said to Balak himself: saying,